When the Bonds Break
by dib07
Summary: "Yami!" Yugi started to shout. "Answer me! Please don't do this! I'm sorry, dammit!" He tried pulling on the handle, kicking at the door or bashing it with his fists. "Why won't you answer?"
1. Part 1

**When the Bonds break**

_By Dib07_

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**A/N:**_ This was supposed to be a oneshot, but as it turned out, it turned into 2 parts. This one came out a little more angsty than I intended. Then again, I think all my stories do that. If you want the last part, please give me a line. :)  
_

**Please do not persuade me to ship characters, and please tolerate any shipping of any characters.**

**I write the characters as I envision them. Nothing more and nothing less.**

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1:

"You little punk! Get back out here so I can throw you into the river!"

Yugi was running as fast as his little legs could carry him. He didn't dare look back. More than twice he thought they had brunted abreast of him, their arms sneering out, their hands ready to snatch him up. Somehow he had managed to stay ahead of them, but not far ahead. They'd follow him wherever he'd go, and catch up with him if he dared slow down for anything, be it traffic or to greet his own front door.

Scared and panicky, all logic had retreated underground, leaving him alone with hot, simmering fear.

"We just wanna play! Come on back 'ere you little runty coward!"

He slipped down an alleyway, screamed past one lady and then a solitary man before zipping down a brick junction that was stifled with litter and broken bits of scaffolding. Still, they chased him like a couple of thick-set lions who hadn't eaten for a few weeks.

He dived down into a new mindset while his body ran and dived under steel pipes on autopilot. He didn't know he was capable of such a thing, but he had no time to admire this.

He faced Yami's door: the door that was always shut so tight that it may as well have been part of the wall.

There was no time for niceties or apologies. He whammed the door open and clattered into near-darkness that lit up around him. Even here, in the spirit realm of his puzzle, he could feel his body running out of energy. Soon those two men would be on top of him, and they'd either hurt him or kill him. He didn't want to find out. He knew that Yami wouldn't allow it. A guardian was a guardian. So why hadn't he appeared sooner?

Then it made sense as Yugi hurried deeper inside, the light affixed to his person as if he carried a glow stick. Yami was before him. He was sitting upright in a stone chair, arms folded over his chest in the middle of an empty room.

The Game King was asleep.

_God damn you, Yami!_

Yugi rushed over but when he got within a metre of Yami's presence, he felt a deep pang of guilt. Waking him seemed iniquitous. Immoral. The Game King slept with not a crease on his face. There was no arrogant smirk. No frown born of deliberation. And no disapproving scowls.

He looked endearingly – normal.

Yet urgency sliced through Yugi like a hammer and he was on his guardian, one hand on each of his shoulders as he shook him. "Yami! Mou hitori no boku!"

Yami twinged, grimacing as his dark dreams were harried away. His eyes slowly opened and he was modestly dismayed to see Yugi here, before him. Yugi gave him a pleading look he had only ever seen a few times since their odd relationship of protégé and guardian had begun. "Aibou?" He had to do his best to repress a yawn. "What is your purpose here?"

"We have to switch!" Yugi begged, "Now!"

Yami leaned back in his chair, his arms still folded. "Is that so? Why? Is there a duel to be won?"

"No! I'm in danger! I'm being chased!"

"By whom?"

"Yami!" Yugi cried, taking the pharaoh's hand in urgency, "You've got to stop them! Now! I think one of them has a knife!"

"Easy, Aibou. When you are here, time almost stops. Easy." His silky, rich voice reminded Yugi to breathe. "There. That wasn't so hard, was it?" He leaned forward and touched Yugi's face with one hand. "I'd never let any harm come to you. Do you honestly wish it of me to stop them?"

Yugi hesitated a tiny fraction, then nodded. "Please. I don't know what they'll do to me."

Yami eased himself to his feet.

The transition was instant. Yugi plunged back into the safety of his mind: distant, and away from harm. Yami skidded to a stop next to some bins. Beside him was a huge, looming apartment. The sky was darkening: the sunset a candid glow of tired red as it melted into the horizon. Yami wanted to watch it disappear completely but he had more pressing matters at hand.

The two men who had been pursuing Yugi came running into the clearing. Yet when they saw their prey no longer running, and looking a little different than before, they braked to a halt. But their confusion didn't last long.

"Tired of running, are ya?" Spoke the larger of the two. He had long, red hair. "Don't you worry. We'll make sure no one hears you scream."

Yami grinned assuringly as if he was representing a duel of cards. "I suggest you turn round now, and withdraw. I don't wish to harm anyone."

"Harm? You kidding me? Jesus, what have you been on?"

"Maybe the fear has blown his circuits?" Asked the tall lad's friend. "He's got nowhere left to run after all."

"Well, I want this over and done with. I hate little guys like you being so damn popular. Just because you're good at card games doesn't make you God." And the red head went to take something from the pocket of his dark raincoat. And it was no knife. He drew out an automatic gun. On the end of the shaft was a silencer. Yami's eyes widened slightly.

He aimed it squarely at the pharaoh.

"Wait just one moment." Yami declared softly. "You can pull that trigger, but first let's play a game. It'll make things a little more... entertaining for the both of us."

The red head laughed, but the gun's aim didn't waver. "A game? You really have lost it, haven't ya? Now stop being dumb! I have the gun!"

Yami laughed back. His chortles made the two men look at each other. Their grins were wiped clean from their faces.

After Yami was done, he smiled savagely. "Here's how we play. We each ask a question. If we know the answer, we win the round. If however one of us can't think of the answer, then the other person wins."

The red head narrowed his steel eyes. "Hey man, fuck you! I don't have to listen to your stupid charades! What are you, twelve?"

"Then I'll start." Yami said with a smirk. "What has many entrances but only one exit?"

"Go to hell!" The red head shouted, and hit the trigger.

"I've already been there." Yami replied with a gleam in his eyes.

The red head looked at his friend. He hit the trigger again.

Yami opened up his hand. What lay in his palm were six unfired bullets.

The red head stepped back. "H-How in the name of...?"

"The answer was, a maze." Yami clicked his fingers.

There was no silencer to dim the violence. The two men went down BANG after BANG. On the sixth retort, it all went quiet as the two men lay in a growing pool of glistening red. Yami surveyed them for a moment, his hands wedged in his pockets. Then he spun round, the tails of his cobalt coat sailing in the night wind, and he stalked off.

xxx

"How... how could you?"

The room was filled with the sound of tears.

The dark crevices of the room seemed to bleed desolation. Even the weather outside had seemed to clench with ruin so much so that it began to release the pressure as solemn, cold rain. It splattered gently against the windowpane in slow cadence.

"How could you... mou hitori no boku?"

"He had a gun, young one. I had to punish him and his cohort. He would have killed you!"

Yugi sat with his arms wrapped around his knees. Only one lamplight highlighted his deep, flat shadow as it ran across the room. Yami had no shadow. He sat, as light as a feather on Yugi's bed. Yugi wished he would cry. At least then he would know that his spirit couldn't be all bad. But not a single tear warmed Yami's eyes. And not a scrap of sorrow was given about the two men he had so assertively killed.

Yugi raised his head long enough to look Yami in the eye. "You're a monster!"

"Aibou... no!"

"I asked you to stop them! Now they're dead! Don't you care! Don't you have any conscience?"

"Look, I was trying..."

"I don't care for it! You've done a bad thing! Two men are dead, Yami! And it's all my fault!" He slipped the rope from his neck and held the puzzle in his hands. Yami had risen from the bed, and was looking at him in great concern.

"Aibou, if I could take it back, I would! Please! We can work this out together!"

"No. I'm done!" He approached his clothes closest and opened the door. Inside were hangers, old summer clothing, a spare school uniform and shoes covered in mothballs tucked right at the back. "If I hadn't have met you, then those two people would be alive right now! I didn't think I could hate anything in this world, Yami. But you've proven me wrong."

Yami opened his mouth, about to utter a reprisal or an apology; Yugi didn't hang around to see which. He pulled out a piece of the puzzle and the spirit was vaporized, his image gone in the blink of an eye. Trying to stifle back tears of anger, sadness and dismay, Yugi placed the incomplete puzzle on a shelf. Then he banged the closest doors shut as if the thin sheets of wood were iron bars to shun out his partner.

The little golden piece he had removed was still clutched tightly in his right fist. He threw it ungracefully into his middle desk drawer, where it could mingle with other exiled items such as misplaced erasers, broken pencils, blunt sharpeners and crumpled notepads.

His connection with Yami had been severed. No longer did he feel tied to Yami's thoughts or emotions. Instead there was an emptiness that every other person felt.

Yugi left his room, slamming the door shut behind him.

xxx

Yugi strained for the news for the next few days, expecting a police report or an investigation over the two deaths of Roger and Evais. They'd be hunting for the murderer: a murderer who had managed to slay both young men with bullets. But he heard nothing.

Still, his dread and anxiety remained, and as there was no spirit to absorb some of the worry, Yugi was left alone to deal with it.

Joey and his other friends noticed his quiet behaviour, but even more so they noticed the absence of the puzzle around his neck. Yugi _never_ went anywhere without his puzzle. He even took it with him to the bathroom; and lay down next to it in bed like it was some kind of plush toy. When Joey chivvied him for information at dinner time when they were in the school hall eating at their tables, Yugi refused to talk about it, and when Joey didn't let up, he took his plate and walked off to eat somewhere else.

So Joey gave Yugi space.

"I think the two of them had a falling out." Anzu said. It was still lunch time. Joey and the others had eaten and the bell had yet to ring to signal the start of a new lesson. Joey had sat down with Honda and Anzu in the library where it was mostly quiet. Yugi was nowhere to be found. They had all looked exhaustively for him.

"Falling out?" Joey looked incredulous. "How da heck do you fall out with a spirit? Besides, those two are tight, man! I mean tight!"

"Yeah, I know. But even the bestest of best of friends fall out." Anzu rested her chin on her hand with her elbow on the table.

Joey didn't seem too worried. "Maybe he left the puzzle at home cuz he's in the middle of cleaning it?"

"Since when has he let a speck of dust fall on that thing?"

Joey could only shrug. "If I was a keeper of a puzzle, maybe I'd know!"

"Maybe we should just ask the little guy?" Honda bodged in.

"Go fuck yourself, Honda. He'll come around. He always does."

xxx

On the fourth day, Yugi was beginning to lose his quietly built resolve. The foundations of his grief were loosening, as was his deep worry. No one had come forward about the two murders. Yet even so, a murder was a murder. Living with their deaths on his head was a damning thing. Yugi no longer tasted the food he ate, or felt the brush as he cleaned his teeth with it. Even his lessons in class went over his head. He couldn't grasp anything. It was as if he was sleepwalking through life.

But as the days rolled by, the awful blow he had suffered began to lessen. He still woke up most nights in a sweat after envisioning their brutal deaths, but when he cried out for Yami he realized that the puzzle was still incomplete, and so Yami could not answer him or comfort him.

And so Yugi would cry himself back to sleep, stuck between corridors of indecision.

On the sixth day, Yugi stood by the closest, staring at the wooden doorknobs that would grant him access to the golden pyramid. His anger returned, almost as raw as the night when Yami had cut those two men down. But he could not stay mad at him forever. This kind of existence was not good for either of them.

However, the old cut of betrayal had barely healed.

He opened the closest doors. His stomach fell into icy knots when he laid eyes on the pyramid. Its left side glowed with glaring sunlight from the window. Its missing piece looked like a black tunnel that had drilled into the puzzle's heart.

Yugi reached in slowly, his fingers shaking.

_Yami was only protecting me, I understand that. And they had a gun. But he killed them! He didn't give them a chance!_

Cradling the puzzle in one hand, he closed the closest doors and walked over to the desk. He bent down and opened the middle door to scrounge around for the missing piece. His fingers explored a den full of bits and bobs along with loose items that would otherwise have been thrown away. Panic closed over his heart when no golden shape came to the surface of his hunt. That was when he realized how much he still loved his spirit, despite what he had committed.

Maybe it was foolish love.

Doomed love.

But love it still was.

The golden piece had fallen down behind a set of notepads. Yugi scrounged desperately for it after seeing its familiar golden glint, and brought it into his hand.

How easy it was, to remove a piece and then lose it.

Yugi began to fiddle to get the puzzle and the bar of gold to fit. His fervour to see Yami again only intensified.

The golden piece slipped in smoothly, and the puzzle was complete.

Yugi expected to feel Yami right away, and to see his comely figure materialize.

But Yugi continued to feel that strange, empty feeling. And no figure emerged.

Hastily, Yugi put the rope around his neck and turned the puzzle up so that he was looking at the big, all-seeing eye. "I'm sorry I shunned you, but I needed time alone. Time to think things through."

Nothing happened.

It was like he was talking to a piece of gold.

"Yami!" He entreated more persistently. "I'm sorry, do you hear! But you shouldn't have done what you did! Now say something! Anything! Get angry! Get upset with me!"

There had never been a time when Yami hadn't replied, though sometimes he did sleep deeply, and more than once Yugi had to 'shake' him awake like he had done before the goons had showed up to cause all this tension.

Yugi, flaming with determination, awoke in his spirit room. Then he marched over the threshold of his door and into the cold, quiet corridor between their rooms. Yami's door was shut – as always.

Yugi walked up to it and placed one hand on the iron handle with every intention of levering it down to open its secret depths. Only this time when he pressed on the handle, the door simply didn't open.

This shook Yugi right up. Yami had _never, ever_ locked the door on him.

Yugi's anger and distress returned full-throttle. "Yami! Yami open the door! Please! Let's talk!" He knocked on the cold entrance and stepped back, taking a moment to harness his heartache. Yami had probably been stirred from a deep sleep and was still making his way to the door. Or perhaps he was sulking a little himself, and was waiting to surprise him?

But there was no echo of emotion from Yugi's doppelganger, and no noise. Yugi may well have been knocking on the entryway to a mausoleum.

"Yami!" Yugi started to shout. "Answer me! Please don't do this! I'm sorry, dammit!" He tried pulling on the handle, kicking at the door or bashing it with his fists. "Why won't you answer?"

He thought that Yami was perhaps playing a trick on him.

A mean trick.

So where was the magician to fess up to his prank?

Yugi's determination was reduced to ashes as he succumbed to the ground, his back pressed against the door.

xxx

Night came and went. Morning found Yugi on his way to school, still talking to his puzzle. First he was begging, pleading. Then he ranted at it, demanding a response. Those demands turned into tears.

Joey found him crying in the locker room.

"Hey, pal. What happened? Did someone beat you up? I'll kill 'em! Just point me in the right direction and they're as good as dead!" He wrapped an arm around his little duelling partner as Yugi sobbed.

When he was able to get enough breath in, he choked after a few false starts: "Yami's not r-r-replying to me!"

"Not replying to ya? How long's this being going on for? An hour? Possibly two?"

"Since y-yesterday!"

Joey sighed. Anzu had been right all along. Yami and Yugi had had a falling out. It perfectly explained Yugi's very odd behaviour lately. "What happened?"

Yugi hiccupped and tried to breathe. His nose was streaming, his ears were hot from crying so hard. His little body was shaking feverishly. "I shouted at h-h-him! He did a bad t-thing and I was upset!"

"All right, easy, easy." He scrounged around in his pockets and came up with a tissue. Yugi blew his nose on it with furious vigour. "What happened?"

"I... I... was being chased by two g-guys..."

"Uh huh."

Yugi blew his nose a second time. Though he had eased off his tears, his little body continually hitched in Joey's arms. He was badly upset, and his whole body was in a mess. Joey had never seen him this distressed before. Even bullies could not reduce him to this many tears.

Only Yami could, it seemed.

"And we s-switched... They had a g-gun. He then k-killed t-them..."

Joey lowered his voice. "Yami killed them?"

"Y-Yeah." Yugi dabbed at his wet eyes. "I... I was really hurt that he did it. So I put the p-puzzle a-away after dismantling a piece." He began to fiddle with the damp tissue in his shivery hands. "Now he w-w-won't talk t-to me...!"

"Oh boy." _Way to go, Joey. Now you've just opened a nest full of snakes_, he thought. "Man what a pig sty, huh?"

Yugi just nodded. He needlessly dabbed at his eyes again, his body still jerking with distress in Joey's arms.

"But they had a gun, Yuug. They would have killed you without hesitation, it sounds like. Why were they even after you?"

He gave a modest shrug. "Over c-cards."

Joey gave him a friendly hug. "He was only doing what he thought was best. I'd fork over my entire identity if I could have a guardian angel like Yami! You're one lucky kid!"

"But now he... he isn't t-talking to m-me..."

"Maybe he just needs time? Come on, you know him! This is the guy who can make a comeback any time he wants!"

"I told him I hated him!" He helplessly blubbered into tears afresh.

Joey squeezed him affectionately. "Go home, bud. Take the rest of the day off. I'll tell Mr. Leeway that you're sick with the flu."

Yugi nodded, though he showed no enthusiasm.

"Maybe Yami needs time. Go on, go home. And have a rest. Things will look brighter when you wake up."

**TBC**


	2. Part 2

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**A/N: **I have received such wonderful reviews since I last submitted the first part of this story! :3 It's awesome that you enjoyed it! The voting won for this story, and I am really glad it won. It deserved to have its final part, especially after it received such stunning feedback! :)**  
**

**i:** Your praise and support warmed me greatly. So far ever since I re-joined the Yugioh fandom after a long decade of absence I wasn't sure what to expect but my stories have been well received, and your words are evidence of that. I hope you can still be around to pop over and read this final part so that you are no longer left hanging! It's quite testing, to never be able to read a story's conclusion! And you remind me of myself; looking for character and quality in a story. ;) And plot of course! Yes, both characters did seem to be quite heavy handed in part 1- Yugi with his hasty retreat of his other self's act and Yami with his Punishment Game. So read and enjoy! :)

**Guest:** Here you go! ;)

** YamiKitty223:** Hello there! Hope this update didn't come too late! ;)

**Please do not persuade me to ship characters, and please tolerate any shipping of any characters.  
**

**I write the characters as I envision them. Nothing more.**

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When the Bonds break

PART 2

By Dib07

Yugi hoped that time would ease this dilemma. Time was all he really had as a weapon. Nothing else could get him through Yami's door, and no amount of kicking or pleading or shouting worked either.

Yugi hung around for a miracle, thinking that one day Yami would come strolling back into his life and things would return to normality.

And so Yugi tried to live a normal life without his counterpart for awhile. He did his homework. He ate his breakfast and dinner. He helped his Grampa around the shop. He attended school every weekday.

He duelled against Joey during lunchtime and the weekends. Always he wore the puzzle as if nothing had changed. He took the puzzle with him to the bathroom. He took the puzzle with him to bed.

He was never without it.

Sometimes at night he'd clean it carefully, even if it did not need cleaning. And he'd put some music on in case Yami might respond to it.

A week passed slowly in this fashion. And then another.

And Yugi's hopeful prospects began to wilt.

He thought of darker things to bring Yami back. He considered scratching his favourite duel monster cards in a bid to rouse the dormant Game King. He thought of refusing food, thinking that starvation might be the ticket. He thought about cutting into his own flesh.

He even sat with a knife hovering just above his upturned wrist. Several times he just wanted to slash the flesh there. But he hadn't quite worked up the courage.

And Yami never came to intervene as he sat there, holding a knife to his wrist.

Another week passed.

Joey kept a close eye on his friend, knowing like all good friends should know that something still wasn't right, that Yami still hadn't been summoned. Yugi walked through life increasingly depressed. It showed on his face and in his eyes. Soon his school work began to suffer.

Desperate as his friend, Joey took the puzzle from Yugi's numb profile and quarrelled with an invisible entity.

"If you don't come out this second, I'm gonna throw this tomb of yours at the wall, Mister!" Joey was yelling. Anzu stood by, one hand creeping towards her mouth. Yugi just sat with the same blank expression he had worn for almost three weeks. He neither reacted nor seemed to be listening. "You hear me, Yugioh? You wanna be bits all over the dirty schoolroom floor? Because I'll do it! Ya dumb pharaoh!"

He raised his arm up as if he was about to pitch a baseball, and aimed it at the far wall. The rope dangled down his arm.

"I'm gonna count to three!" He barked angrily. "One!"

"Joey!" Anzu warned, "That's Yugi's puzzle! You can't just smash it!"

"Two!"

"Will you look at yourself?" Honda said, looking like he wanted to restrain his oldest friend, yet at the same time seeing this as necessary, "I don't think violence is the answer!"

"Three!" Joey snapped his arm back, about to pitch Yami's heart all over the wall.

Then a voice, gentle and soft, stopped Joey in his tracks.

"No, please." Joey looked down to see Yugi tugging on the sleeve of his shirt.

"But Yuug!"

"It's okay. I know you want to help."

Joey helplessly returned the puzzle back into waiting hands. Hands that closed over the puzzle lovingly.

Anzu and Honda looked relieved that nothing had been smashed.

"Maybe Yami's just taking a break." And Yugi numbly returned to the seat at his school desk to put it back around his neck.

Joey was about to confront him when Anzu pulled him up. "Leave him be, Joey."

"But, but I can't have Yugi stay like this! We gotta do something!"

"I know, but smashing up his puzzle isn't the answer all right?"

Joey gave her a I-don't-believe-you look. Then he backed down.

xxx

_I'd never let any harm come to you..._

_...any harm come to you._

_Aibou, if I could take it back, I would! Please! We can work this out together!_

_No. I'm done! _

_I didn't think I could hate anything in this world, Yami. But you've proven me wrong._

_But you've proven me wrong..._

_...proven me wrong._

Yugi lay awake in bed, listening to the conversation play out in his mind, and wince at words that were uttered weeks ago.

It felt like longer.

The words haunted him.

Yami's expression haunted him.

Over and over he'd watch himself walk over to the closet. Over and over he would repeat the word 'hate,' and again and again he'd see Yami open his mouth to say something. What could it have been? And then Yami would disappear – blown apart into inky tatters and be gone as soon as the piece of the puzzle was disconnected.

Just. Like. That.

"Yami," he croaked in a hoarse, transparent whisper, "there's only one person I hate in all the world. And that's me."

He said it not in the hopes that it would summon his most cherished friend. He said it because it was true.

He began to know deep inside that Yami wasn't doing this for his own benefit. He wasn't doing this to spite Yugi.

Yami was too proud to relinquish himself to petty quarrelling.

He had done something worse. Yugi was sure. So proud, and so loving of Yugi, Yami may well have been hurt beyond repair at Yugi's reaction; and his words.

And as such, he may have gone crazy with the actuality of his failure. Or, he may have committed himself to the dark.

There was no way of really knowing. Unless Yugi did one last thing.

And that was a desperate thing.

A bad thing.

He considered doing other things instead, but it all came back to that _one_ thing. He was too much of a coward to cut himself. He was too much of a coward to overdose on pills. He was too much of a coward to do anything but one.

Yugi turned to rest on his side, tears dampening his pillow. His eyes fell on the puzzle that he had left resting on the pillow inches from his head. He exhaled a shaky sigh, then closed his eyes in the hopes that he might find some sleep there.

xxx

Blood dripped onto the flagstone floor. A skull sat on the pharaoh's throne: its eyes dark and angry.

Yami was trying to perform magic in the bathroom. He caused the mirror to crack into a wadjet. He wanted to summon dark energy, but it was destroying him. Each successful act of magic ruptured an organ.

"No! You've got to stop! You've got to stop!" Yugi was trying to hold his arms down to prevent him from casting anything else. Yami knelt to the floor, blood trickling from his bottom lip.

"It's fine, Aibou..."

"Nothing's fine!"

A girl had been raped in a remote place close to a forest. Yami stole inside to hurt the man who had done it, but only emerged with destruction and self-loathing in his heart.

The ice buckled and cracked.

Water snared Yugi into a cold and everlasting prison.

Yugi snapped awake and torpidly sat up in bed. The puzzle twinkled in a ray of moonlight that had escaped through the line in the curtain.

Silently he saw Yami open his mouth. Heard his own stinging words. Then he saw himself remove a piece of the puzzle.

He had to do something, or else this scene would play over and over until the very end.

xxx

It was another school day. Though Yugi had woken much earlier the sun was still rising on this warm May morning.

Yugi climbed out of bed and got ready for a new day. The puzzle he hitched around his neck last once he had washed, changed into his uniform and put his school books into his bag. He snuck out the shop at half past eight so that his Grampa wouldn't see him. He didn't want to get noticed for not eating his toast.

He began to walk down the road, leaving the Kame shop behind. The school buses cruised down the road, full of loud children. But Yugi did not head towards the Domino school grounds. He headed towards town.

The puzzle jingled against his chest like a heavy ornament.

The place where Yami had resided in Yugi's heart remained empty. And the abyss was growing like a black hole sucking everything in and giving nothing back.

Somewhere in the street crowd, Joey too was making his way to school early, and was puffing on a cigarette he knew he shouldn't be smoking. A voice or force almost softly seemed to pull at him, causing him to turn his head to look down the road. It could have been a whisper of wind, but Joey looked. And when he did, he saw the tiny figure of Yugi walking the opposite way to school. He was far. And Joey squinted at him. Was it really Yugi?

Joey dropped his cigarette and crushed the burning butt with the heel of his shoe. "What the hell?" And he began marching towards his friend.

The road wasn't just a road. The majority of King's Road was in fact a bridge, also known as King's Bridge. It was the highest bridge in all of Domino, mainly because it was a main conduit for boats as they passed to and from their dock further inland. Yugi came to the balcony. He was so short that he didn't even need to duck under the rails. He stood between the metal pillars, gloomily looking down at the cold, churning waters below. The early morning weather was warm, but the waters down there would be freezing, and black. Visibility would be zero, and there was no bottom down there, and no banks to shore himself up on should he decide against the idea when he was already drowning.

Just looking at the cold, brackish waters as they swirled and heaved made him wrap his arms around his sides. He hoped Yami could sense his thoughts and come out: enter the abyss in Yugi's heart and banish the darkness that crept there. But he never did.

Carefully he slipped his arms from the straps of his school bag and placed it pensively against a pillar.

This was stupid, he knew. He could die, he knew.

It wasn't that he wanted to die.

But so desperate was he to reawaken Yami, that he would do anything, even if it was lethal and mad.

And this was his chance.

He didn't hear Joey's calls as the blond's marching turned into an all-out sprint. He didn't hear the seagulls laconically wailing on the cold breeze. He didn't feel that light, feathery tug on his sleeve.

He leaned towards the edge and let gravity do the rest.

As he dived towards the black, he got pushed down, back into his room. His soul room.

Yugi had landed not in freezing waters, but on his bed.

Though he had sentenced himself, or rather, his body to death, his face lit up with hope and his eyes bled happy tears.

"Y-Yami?"

xxx

The pharaoh plunged into what felt like ice rather than water. Such terrific cold speared his body so suddenly and aggressively that at first he could only stiffen and wince rather than react to submersion. Then a new drive for survival overrode his shock as he was trying to climb to the surface.

/ /Aibou! For Ra's sake! I cannot swim!/ /

It had to be water he woke up in! Out of all his nightmares, all his weaknesses, it had to be water!

His third eye rampaged gold on his forehead, highlighting the water all around him. A spire of black onyx reared upwards from the ugly deep and Yami fetched a ride on it, catching his feet as it raced to the surface. When Yami broke free, he gulped down air even though it burned his chest.

"Yugi!" It was Joey. As Yami looked up, he saw the blond at the railings beside Yugi's abandoned school bag.

"Don't jump in you fool!" Yami yelled. But it was too late. Either that, or Joey wasn't falling for the pharaoh's bravado. The young teen dived into the water with downward poised hands and arms so that his fall was much more graceful.

The onyx shifted and grumbled. Yami uselessly clutched at it, only to find himself sliding back into the water. To be embraced with his vulnerability so swiftly left him in closing panic.

He thought of switching out with Yugi. He was pretty certain his Aibou could swim, but Yugi was traumatised, and too darkened with Yami's absence to be trusted. And Yami's main instinct was to keep Yugi from harm, not to present him with it.

Yami tried the same tactic of summoning fortifications beneath his feet; but having to build them from a depth of forty feet or more tested his endurance. One spire: a weak pillar of bracing rock, billowed upward like a leaning plant. Yami snagged his hands onto it: carrying him once more to the surface. He spat out black water, coughing and choking.

Joey was splashing towards him with keen, powerful breaststrokes.

The rocky column was breaking apart faster: less stable from the beginning. Yami's fingers clawed at its wet, smooth flat top, only to plunge back into the water. His third eye showed him nothing but a vortex of water as it greedily pulled him down. Angry at himself for failing made him reach out into the depths, palm facing outwards. Granite and not onyx shimmied upwards like a reaching finger. But it stopped short and did not ascend any higher.

Swimming was as foreign and as strange to him as space rockets. But he tried anyway, slapping through water without any direction. Fear threw up more power, and as his third eye glowed, all he summoned were creatures borne from his panic. Black creatures sailed silently around him through the water as easily as if they were gliding through air.

NO!

Bubbles exploded through his mouth and nose in a stream that rose upward to a twinkling surface that was impossible to reach.

Then iron-like arms snapped around his tiny middle like clamps and he was thrust upwards. It was Joey. He kicked with his feet as he powered for the surface.

The temptation to forego this agony and switch with Yugi remained, and he ignored it. Never had he switched when the crisis was bad, and had left Yugi to suffer it.

His third eye dissipated and then vanished as he lost strength.

Joey broke the rank surface and heaved in a gasp. Yami could only cough in air while stars benighted his vision in glaring whites and reds.

"Breathe cupcake!" Though in the water, Joey managed with one arm to pound a fist into Yami's back until he could hear the pharaoh draw in breath.

"Dear Ra..." Despite Joey's help, he still found himself vomiting up water.

A boat was coming their way. It was painted red. It was the coastguards.

A life ring was thrown into the water and Joey swam over to grab it whilst tugging Yami with him.

xxx

Yugi thanked the coastguards. Despite trying to commit suicide and still quite wet despite the spare clothes he now wore with a towel about his shoulders, he looked like the happiest little boy they had ever seen.

Joey assured them that he'd stay with his friend all day and not let him near any bridges for awhile. The coastguards were reluctant to see the two boys go. They naturally insisted that they go down to the hospital for checkups.

"Jesus Christ, kid!" Joey was saying as they were walking back from the docks. "You wanna explain ta me why you just decided to jump off a bridge? I should get you home."

Yugi ignored the question and asked one of his own. "You saw him, didn't you?" He needn't have inquired Yami's proof of existence. He felt him once more in his heart. Finally the piece of the puzzle had joined together. Yami's emotions were all over the place, and it made Yugi giggle simply from the joy of feeling him there. Yami may be panicked, a little angry, and quite confused, but none of that mattered.

Because he had him back.

"Yeah, I did." Joey returned thoughtfully. "I did. Poor guy. He didn't exactly deserve to wake up in water. Wait a moment... Don't tell me you jumped to get him..."

Yugi nodded, unable to lie. "It worked, didn't it?"

Joey stopped him by grabbing Yugi's shoulders and spun him round to face him. "You're telling me you tried to kill yourself to bring him out? You could have _actually_ died!"

"Yet here I am."

"You idiot!"

"That's what Yami's thinking right now."

"And did you know why he avoided you so much so that you felt_ 'forced'_ to leap off a fucking bridge? I should strangle the bastard!"

Yugi shrugged and the tears began again. "I... I don't... I don't... k-know..."

Joey cursed and brought him into his arms. "Let's have a hot drink first, okay?" Joey gave him a look, then shook his head. "Man, if you ever do something like that again I am gonna kidnap your Grampa. For reals."

xxx

"Mou hitori no boku..." Yugi brushed against his cheek. He had forgotten that one could cry in the realm of his spirit.

"Yugi." Yami returned without love, or warmth. He stood tall and strong in the doorway of his tomb door with one hand resting on his hip. His eyes were narrowed in anger.

But love filled Yugi. Unconditional love. And it made him cry all the harder. He didn't care if Yami was angry, upset or to blame for his suicidal leap. He was back. "Mou hitori no boku!" He crossed the threshold at a run and squeezed his counterpart tightly. So tightly he could feel bone beneath his cobalt clothing. Hugging him was rare. He could only do it in their secretive chambers deep in their hearts. In the real world, Yami was but a ghost who could only observe unless he chose it necessary to possess Yugi for a duel.

"Aibou..." Yami pushed him away. "You failed."

"I... I failed? I failed what?" His bright distress turned into confusion as tears ran down his cheeks.

Yami's anger mellowed and his eyes were no longer so narrowed. "You failed the test."

Yugi sniffed. "I don't understand. How can I fail, when I have you back?"

"At such risk to yourself!" He suddenly shouted. "You must never again step into danger like that, Yugi! Do you hear me?"

"I can't promise you that. If I did I would be lying to you."

Yami's voice softened. "Aibou, there may come a time when I won't be able to come to your aid. There may come a time when the danger is greater even than I. You are most precious to me. If something should ever happen to you, I am destroyed. Understand?"

"Then why did you leave me?" Yugi protested. "Why did you go?"

"Aibou..."

"Tell me!"

Yami gave him a soft, gentle smile and knelt down so that Yugi didn't have to peer up so high to see into his eyes. "You are the Chosen and I earned your hatred, your distrust. I didn't wish to exist with such knowledge, spirit or not. I'd rather die all over again than see your disappointment."

Yugi shook his head. "But I was wrong! I..."

"No. you weren't wrong. I killed those men against your wishes. And so I made a terrible error. When you removed the piece of the puzzle I decided to test you. I wanted you to live your days without me. For how can you live with me, Yugi? Knowing that I can cause pain to you, as well as joy? So I decided that you did not need me, nor shouldn't need me. So I wanted you to live as before, but without me. You have your friends now, and your family. I am but a hindrance. And all you had to do was prove that you are better than me, and live. But you failed my test as soon as you stepped off that bridge."

Yugi started miserably crying again. "Why c-could I n-never feel... y-you?"

"I banished myself. I didn't know if it could be done, and if it didn't, then I would sleep for an eternity. So hurt was I that I didn't care for my existence."

"How c-could you think t-that way?"

"Aibou, without your approval, and without your light, I just want to die."

More tears flooded Yugi's eyes then and he fell against Yami's chest, crushing him tight.

Yami was a bold duellist. Some could even say arrogant and pompous. But all it took was one wrong word from Yugi, and Yami's world collapsed inward.

"Then you dived into that water." Yami whispered, "And I woke up. And the next thing I knew, I was living in your body, with all that water. Do you love me enough that you would kill yourself?"

Trying to find inner strength for them both, Yugi leaned away from Yami's arms and smiled even though tears glistened on his cheeks. "Yes."

Yami seemed to sigh regretfully. "Why? I am but a wraith who has deemed itself unworthy."

"Yami, we all make mistakes. And yes I guess I failed this test you had for me, because I need you. I will always need you. I need your wisdom, your guidance. I have my friends, but you different. To me you're very real. Don't you... love me too?"

Yami smiled sheepishly as if confessing such things was strange to him. But he gave Yugi the answer he had wanted to hear so badly.

Yugi smiled and all his tears were forgotten.

Yami stood up straight, still looking grave.

Yugi could but laugh. "Your aggression needs some work!"

Yami nodded.

He quietened down and added on a much more serious note, "You'll never hurt another person, right, Yami?"

"Cross my heart and hope to die." Yami said, gesturing at his sternum. It was a phrase he had learned.

Yugi took both his hands in his. "I want us to be together, always."

"Yes, Aibou. Remember, you are the Master. I am but a servant."

xxx

_I want us to be together, always._

A few days later Yugi was sitting at a burger stand with Joey. Since their little debacle after the King's Bridge incident, Yami had been much more receptive and gentle. Yugi spent as much time as he could with him, even in class.

Joey was still a little suspicious. He gave Yugi long looks as if checking to see how mentally stable he was.

And so, while Yugi sat with his best friend, he dived into the spirit room to check up on Yami, who did little else these days but stay attentive.

"I want you to have some fun, mou hitori no boku. Joey's waiting."

"Aibou, what?"

Yami was pushed into reality without warning. Joey was looking at him curiously. "You just did the switch-a-roo thing, right?" He asked.

Yami looked around curiously. The burger joint smelt thickly of meat and sauce. They were sitting at a table by the window and he was wearing Yugi's set of spare clothes.

Joey continued. "Yuug told me why ya did it. And yer both crazy, but I can't stay mad. Yugi tells me how guilty you still feel."

"He can tell?" Yami asked worriedly.

"Yeah. He's like a regular news bulletin, telling us how you're feeling all the time. Anyway, here." He lifted his burger towards the pharaoh. "Wanna bite?"

"Joey! It that beef?"

"O' course it is. What did ya expect it to be? Ostrich?"

Yami cringed.

"Well, it's good to have ya back, Yami." Joey said. "Now, about this whole beef thing. Red meat: delicious! Pork, even better! You ever tried bacon?"

"Sacrilege!" Yami snapped back.

Joey gave him a vague I-don't-believe-this-guy look. "You wanna go for the salad then?"

Yami nodded gingerly. "What is this salad? Is it a special kind of... plant?"

Yugi watched this play out from Yami's heart.

He smiled in the darkness.

**THE END**


End file.
